Behind Glass
by Scrawling Maelstrom
Summary: Kurt unexpectedly falls to a fast-moving, life-threatening infection. As Hank and Ororo tend to him, Ororo thinks of the short time they'd had together, and how close they've somehow grown. The gentle beginnings of KO.
1. The week leading up to Now

**Editor's Note: **Ironically, after I finished this piece, Dave Cockrum himself came down with septicemia, and was admitted into the hospital, on new Years Eve, 2003. It's a very nasty, very fast-acting bacterial infection that gets into your blood, and it can kill you literally hours after you contract it. Worse, it's hell to isolate. All too often, by the time the doctors realize what you have, it's too late to counteract it. Though Dave (thank GOD) is on the mend now, this disease killed Jim Hensen in the early 1990s, and it killed him in just two days…. :(

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**Behind Glass, part 1**

Just two hours ago, Kurt was fine. He was up and around, walking, talking, laughing. Now, as Ororo opened the door into his room, he seemed a man on the edge of death.

He laid in bed, on top of the sheets, stripped to his boxers. He laid on his side, facing away from the window, an arm across his eyes and his rosary in his loosely-clenched fist. He laid limp, drenched with sweat.

Two hours ago, he was fine.

She knew Regis was behind her. He was the one who asked her about Kurt in the first place. He was worried because Kurt was a half-hour late in meeting him for practice. If he saw Kurt now, he'd be terrified. She turned back to the tow-headed boy.

"Regis, I need you to go get Dr. Hank," she told him firmly. "Right now."

Regis swallowed and nodded. His form blurred quickly, like a hologram being disrupted, and was gone in a yellow flash. Ororo moved into Kurt's room and closed the door behind her.

"Kurt?" she asked. "Are you awake?

"_Sturm_?" he asked back faintly.

"Yes, it's me."

She moved to his bedside. He mumbled something in German. Come to think of it, he'd spoken her name in German as well. He knew she didn't understand much of his native tongue.

"English, Kurt," she said, running a hand through his short hair.

"Could you please... close the drapes," he murmured. "The light hurts."

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Kurt seemed to have a knack for falling into situations that required medical aid. Just two weeks ago, during an ambush, he wound up nearly electrocuted. The attack burned his right arm and blew both his eardrums, forcing Dr. Henry McCoy to reconstruct them. Hank performed a double tympanoplasty that night, and Kurt was not certain to regain all of his hearing. But over the course of four more days, even with the cotton in his ears, it became clear that Kurt's hearing was as good as ever. All heaved a sigh of relief.

Unfortunately for Kurt, that was hardly the end of it. Besides a regimen of antibiotics, he had to "take it easy" during his recovery. Forgoing some of the things, like drinking through a straw or swimming, was easy. But the restriction also included activities such as teleporting, working out, or even hanging upside-down. Within a single day of this restriction, the normally very active Nightcrawler was literally climbing the walls.

One night, Ororo found him alone in the rec. room, sitting in front of the currently inactive TV and looking through a stack of DVDs.

"Can't sleep?" she asked.

He glanced up. "I have never needed much sleep. Now that I am 'on restriction', I need even less."

"And you're bored out of your mind," she finished for him.

"Oh, yes. Very bored. I must have read everything interesting in the library. Because I do not want to read the boring things, I am now looking for something that I've only seen ten or fifteen times."

She sat by his side and looked at the selection he'd pulled. They were all action movies, half of them swashbuckling adventures like Captain Blood, Robin Hood, and Sinbad. She'd never gotten into the "rope swinging, sword flashing" genre of which Kurt was so fond. It all seemed so fake, somehow, as if a man wouldn't be shot or run through six times while he was making witty remarks.

She picked out Raiders of the Lost Ark. "If you watch this one, I'll be glad to make some popcorn and watch with you. As long as you sit on the couch and not the wall."

He smiled. "Thank you. I'd like that." He then sighed theatrically and leaned his head against the back of the sofa, staring at the ceiling. "And don't worry about me sitting on the wall. Hank put a stop to that, too."

"Oh, no."

"Oh, yes. No more climbing. The only exercise I get now is jumping to conclusions."

She laughed and tousled his always-unruly hair as she stood up. "Poor baby, forced to take it easy for the duration. Do you know how many of the kids would give their right arm to be in your place?"

"Yes, and they're all in my gym class," he replied, grinning. "I can direct, but I can't give examples. That leaves so much more time for me to run them ragged."

"Well, they'd be run ragged more often if you didn't let them sweet talk you into giving performances to eat up time."

He gasped and stared, forlorn, at that same ceiling, a hand over his chest. "I feel so... so _used_...."

The two of them met for a movie in the rec. room every night after that first time. Kurt had seen everything in Xavier's ever-expanding library. Many movies he'd seen to the point of being able to quote lines from memory, but only if prompted. He made a deliberate effort to accommodate her, even to the point of sitting "correctly" on the couch instead of his usual edge perch. Unlike practically ever other man she'd known, he didn't object to romances, something she discovered when she chose Sleepless in Seattle, a "chick flick" if there ever was one.

_Or maybe he just won't object to anything I pick_, she thought as she leaned against him, legs up on the armrest, idly nibbling on popcorn. _ I wonder which it is?_ Aloud, she said, "Do you mind if I ask something a little strange?"

He looked down at her. "Go ahead."

"Do you actually like romance movies, or are you just being gallant again?" she asked, smiling.

"Ah, you are used to little boys whining about the 'kissing parts', yes?" he asked back.

"I'm not sure I'd ever call a grown man a 'little boy'. Most of the men I've met break out in a cold sweat at the mere mention of a film like this."

" 'Little boy' is not a physical age, it is a mental age. Little boys think that just admitting emotions exist makes them a sissy. Little boys also do not recognize the subtle difference between 'that is a nice dress' and 'did you paint that on'."

She smiled a bit at that last comment. She'd heard many calls like that from men outside the estate grounds. The polite way Kurt said it reduced a maddening, chauvinistic hoot to something she could actually laugh at.

"There is always something to learn from well-done romances," he added, placing a hand on her shoulder. "Besides. A gentleman must take others' wishes into account, especially when they come from his lady."

It was the first time he'd ever referred to her that way. From anyone else, she would have glared them into submission for such presumption. From him, she rather liked it.

"You're such a smooth talker," she said. "You must have had the ladies curled around your fingers back home."

"Well, no. In the circus, we were family. I did not get much chance to court."

"So you 'studied' to make the most of your chance when you got it?" she asked.

"Does it show so much?" he asked back, his voice loaded with spurious disappointment.

"Yes, it does. And in my opinion, that's a good thing."

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Ororo went to Kurt's window and drew the curtains. The room was much darker now. She looked back at Kurt, specifically at his tail, which would move even when he was asleep. It was just as limp as everything else, draped over the side of the bed and laying flat on the floor. It almost didn't look like it was alive. She went back to his side and touched his shoulder. His skin was burning hot. High, quick onset fever, light sensitivity, lethargy.…

_Please, tell me this isn't what it's starting to look like_, she silently pleaded.

TBC…..


	2. Two days ago to Now

**Behind Glass, part 2**

Two days ago, she had caught sight of Kurt helping Regis outside.  As wonderful as he was with the students, he was even more so with Regis.  He had taken the young teleporter under his wing like a long lost brother, and Regis positively worshipped him.  It wasn't surprising.  Regis was the only other teleporter in the school; a rare power with unique problems, only solvable by personal trial and error.  Kurt had done so much of that already.  He was a wealth of experience.  And, by Kurt's experience, the safest way to teleport often included appearing near the ceiling, so he was molding Regis into a tumbler and acrobat as well. 

Ororo stood at the French doors and watched those two in particular out of the plethora of students on the grounds.  Regis had already gotten more confident under Kurt's mentorship.  If things progressed just as well in the future, Regis would grow from an awkward pre-teen with horn-rimmed glasses to a strong, muscular young man.

Kurt seemed to wince and turn his head, a hand to his ear.  She couldn't hear what they were saying at this distance, but training was clearly over, and Kurt was heading for the mansion. 

"What's the matter?" she asked as he drew near.

"My ear is hurting," he muttered.

He did not look in her eyes as he spoke.  Apparently, this was a source of embarrassment.

"Have you seen Hank about it?" she asked, following him indoors.

"I am going to him now," he replied.  "I haven't had an ear hurt since I was six."

"Earache."

_"Was?"___

"In English, we call that an earache.  It's all one word.  You've been taking the antibiotics, haven't you?"

He rolled his eyes and smiled.  "Yes, mother.  I've been a good boy."

"I'm just concerned, that's all."  She followed him into the elevator as well.  "If you've been taking the antibiotics, this shouldn't have happened."

"One pill does not work for everything.  I'm sure all Hank will have to do is switch to something else."

**:**

It didn't take long for Hank to make his diagnosis.  One of Kurt's ears was healing nicely, the other was infected.

"The good news is that you won't have to take the pills anymore," Hank said.  He then turned about and produced a hypodermic.  "The bad news is that now you get to take shots instead."

Kurt, sitting on the side of the bed, eyed the needle warily.  "And which arm does it go into?"

"Arm?" Hank asked back, batting his eyes innocently.

Kurt mumbled something in German that sounded suspiciously obscene.  Ororo tried very hard not to smile.  She knew it wasn't funny, yet it was hard to keep her lips from twisting.  Kurt sighed and looked up at her.

"This is embarrassing enough," he said.  "The least you could do is turn around."

"Oh, no need for that," Hank chimed.

He whipped a curtain around the two of them and the bed, leaving Ororo on the outside.

After a silent moment, she heard Kurt warn, "You'd better not think of trying that glove thing, Hank."

Ororo burst into giggles.

"You're a _great_ help, woman," Kurt called over the divider.

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Ororo knelt in front of Kurt and pulled his arm away from his face.  As she did so, the rosary slipped from his fingers to the floor.  He did not make an attempt to retrieve it, nor even make a sound.  His eyes were closed, his skin sticky with sweat.

"Kurt, look at me," she ordered.  "Open your eyes."

He did so, but his gaze was unfocused.  It wasn't life and energy that shone in his eyes, but fever.

"Tell me how you feel."

He closed his eyes again.  His lips barely moved as he spoke.  "Tired.  Very tired."

"That's not all of it, Kurt.  You're in pain.  I can see it.  Tell me where it hurts."

"In the dark... it's not so bad...."

He wasn't going to tell her.  Damn it, this was no time for being stoic and brave.  If he had what she thought he did, every second counted. 

"Kurt, I need you to do something for me," she said, holding his clammy hand in both of hers.  "You once told me you haven't had an earache since you were six.  I want you to be six, again.  I want you to complain about every little thing that's wrong.  I want you to whine about how much it hurts, and where it hurts, and how bad you feel.  I want you to do that for me.  Please?"

He grimaced, a shudder running through his body.  For a few seconds he said nothing.  Then he grimaced again, and she could see his eyes water even though they were closed.

"It hurts," he whispered.  "It hurts badly."

She held onto his hand with one of her own.  With her other hand, she stroked his arm.  "Where?"

"My head is pressure.  It pushes behind my eyes to make tears.  My neck is hurting like it is broken.  I cannot move it."

The door opened and Henry McCoy entered the room, Regis right behind him.  Ororo spun on bended knee.

"I think it's meningitis," she whispered.

TBC…..


	3. Yesterday to Now

**Behind Glass, part 3**

Yesterday Kurt received a "care package" from Anshelm; an old friend from his circus days who had long since taken up residence in the United States. Every two or three weeks he would send Kurt something in the mail, which invariably included another recording of his past performances. Apparently, the man was still in contact with the Munich Circus, and was going to a lot of trouble to take their homespun videotapes and turn them into DVDs for Kurt. Anytime something came for Kurt, half the mansion clustered around to see if he'd gotten another disk they could watch with him. So far, they had yet to be disappointed.

This day, mail came late. All the students were out playing baseball, girls versus boys. Ororo knew she had a perfect opportunity to give Kurt his package without the entire student body finding out. She found him in his room... sort of. Actually, he was perched on the windowsill, watching the game below. She knocked on the doorframe and he turned at the waist, still perfectly balanced.

She waved the small box in her hand. "Guess who?"

His face lit up. "Anshelm?"

She nodded. "Feels like another disk, too."

Kurt looked like he was about to backflip off the sill, then caught himself and stepped off instead.

"Someday I want to invite him here," he said. "The man works at ILM, you know. I think he would love to see us all in action."

"Someday, perhaps." She gave him the mailer. "You know, for once I'd like to see one of these without the entire school sitting in front of me."

Kurt looked back at the window, a sly smile on his face. "Well, they will be busy for a while, I think. I see no harm in a private showing."

They wound up down in the rec. room again, alone together, as they had been every night. This time, however, it was still daylight, and she had absolutely no idea what they were about to watch. Kurt opened up the box and removed the DVD from its case. He read the label and laughed.

"I don't believe it! Someone actually managed to film this one!" He popped the DVD into the tray and settled back next to Ororo. "I think you will like this performance. It's the last routine we did before I left for America; 'Fearless Demon Hunters'."

"All things considered, that sounds like tempting fate," she told him.

"Ah, not this one. It's a comedy. We worked on this for a long time to make perfect."

None of the tapes of his performances were done by professional hands. The rare jostle or moment out of focus let everyone know this was an amateur effort, most likely done by a fellow carny. This recording opened up in very low light, just enough to make out the tent posts and audience bleachers. At first there was silence, then came the sound of snoring.

"Is that _you_?" she asked.

"Just watch," he replied, grinning ear-to-pointed-ear.

A spotlight slowly came up, highlighting a platform placed low on the main tent pole, no more than ten feet up. Yes, it was him snoring, though amplified with some sort of wireless microphone. Ororo gave an incredulous gasp and burst into laughter, along with the rest of the audience on tape. Nightcrawler was curled up on the platform, ostensibly asleep, wearing only white and red polkadotted boxer shorts, his tail dangling over the edge. In his arms he hugged a large, truly obnoxious, pink, stuffed bunny.

"God, you look so cute it's _disgusting_!" she cried.

"If the night is cooler, I would wear an entire pajama outfit," he whispered.

The entire area lightened up, revealing four costumed men with improbably big weapons. They stage-whispered in German, of course, but Anshelm had thoughtfully added English subtitles this time.

"There he is!"

"He doesn't look dangerous...."

"That's not the point! Do you know how much he's worth?"

At that point, Kurt's tail started to move, as if it was awake and sentient. It twitched, moved up, and snaked towards the voices. The "demon hunters" were oblivious to the rather obvious movement. Ororo tittered.

"The Nightcrawler is worth ten million marks to the right buyer!"

"What on earth for?"

"Someone said his blood carried the secret formula for a new kind of dog food."

Nightcrawler's tail reared up with something very like horror. Then it looped back over the platform and started tapping him on the shoulder, occasionally "looking" to the armed cadre with growing apprehension. Nightcrawler's snores were interrupted as he tried to wave it off. Then the tail started slapping his face, despite his feeble attempts to catch it and hold it away. Ororo couldn't stop giggling. The image of Kurt's tail waking him up was the silliest thing she'd ever seen.

"Was it your idea to have your tail wake you like that?" she asked.

He shrugged. "Well, sometimes it does seem like it has a mind of its own...."

Finally the tail looped around his neck and dragged his head over the edge of the platform, forcing him to see the four men, who where aiming their weapons right at him. With a yelp of shock, Nightcrawler teleported away just as the men fired, reappearing behind them on another tent pole. Music started up, the men turned and fired, blanks and flashes went off, and the chase was on. For the next five minutes, he lead them on a merry chase throughout the entire tent, running up poles, across ropes, swinging from trapezes, and occasionally diving very close to the audience before teleporting away. More than once, he steered the hunters into catching each other with their own weapons. All through this, he kept a frantic hold on his plush toy, though he switched his grip regularly. Sometimes it was in his hands, sometimes his talon-like feet, and twice he gave it to his tail, which seemed none too happy at this turn of events. Ororo laughed so hard she almost fell off the sofa. The audience howled its approval.

Finally, two of the demon hunters pinned Nightcrawler down in a crossfire while the other two readied a bazooka. With a loud, flashy boom, the bazooka went off, and Nightcrawler's bunny exploded into bits. The music ceased and everyone froze. Nightcrawler looked at the one piece of his treasured toy that he had left, a floppy pink ear. Then he slowly turned to the bazooka pair, uttering a growl so deep, so guttural and feral, that the audience gave a collective "oooh" of anticipation. The bazooka pair took a nervous step back. The one who fired the shot hastily shoved the weapon into his partner's hands and pointed at him.

The music started up again. Now the tables were turned. No matter where they went, Nightcrawler caught up with them. One hunter even fled into the audience, but Nightcrawler swung in on a rope and caught him with his tail and legs, dragging him kicking and screaming into the main ring. All of the demon hunters eventually wound up tossed into a massive freight crate that had somehow appeared when no one was looking. As Nightcrawler flung the last man in, he crouched on the edge of the box, tail lashing back and forth, and surveyed the audience. To their ecstatic shouts and urging, he slowly crawled into the wooden box, like a panther stalking his prey. As the lights began to dim again, he closed the lid behind him with his tail, loud thumps issued from inside, and the erstwhile demon hunters started screaming.

Ororo was breathless from laughter. She stole a glance at Kurt, to see him watching the screen with grinning pride, both at the performance itself and her enjoyment. He loved this so much. How difficult it must have been for him to leave the spotlight.

Perhaps she could find a way to make it up to him. She started thinking of the best place to buy stuffed rabbits.

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Hank said nothing as he moved to Kurt's bedside, his face grim. Ororo moved out of the way for him as he knelt by Kurt's head. Hank opened his instrument bag and brought out a thermometer.

"Kurt, open your eyes and look at me," he ordered sternly. "We have to take your temperature."

Kurt didn't. Even at Ororo's urging, he made no reply. Hank rolled him onto his back and used his uninfected ear to take his temperature. He lifted both Kurt's eyelids and checked for pupil response. Kurt laid, unresponsive, throughout the procedure.

"Symptoms besides fever?" Hank asked her.

"Severe headache, neck painful and immobile, light sensitivity, lethargy, clammy hands." _Someone, please tell me I'm wrong. Tell me it's just a bad case of the flu....___

Hank reached over and turned on the light. "Dammit, we need more light in this room."

Regis appeared by the drapes and pulled them wide open. Hank muttered a word of thanks, but he was too focused on Kurt for anything else.

"He was fine two hours ago," Ororo said.

"It can come on this suddenly," Dr. McCoy told her. "I've seen it happen."

"Shouldn't the antibiotics have stopped this?"

"Obviously, they weren't the right kind." He removed the thermometer. "104.3 degrees. I'm doing a spinal tap."

He flipped Kurt onto his side without even the veneer of gentleness, then manipulated him into a fetal position, stretching his spine in a way to expose the gaps between his vertebra. Then he brought out a very large, very nasty-looking hypodermic, and with surgical precision jabbed it into the small of Kurt's back, right in one of those gaps. Kurt didn't so much as twitch. Even his tail remained limp.

"I know it's hard to tell against dark blue skin, but I want you to check him over for any signs of a rash while I'm doing this," Hank ordered. "Anything out of the ordinary, I have to know."

Ororo did so, running her fingers across Kurt's back. It would be easier for her to feel a rash on his indigo skin than to see it. She felt a few slightly raised spots near his neck that she knew could not be part of his intricate scars. She swallowed, hard, and kept her fingers on that spot.

"Here. I think I've found something."

Hank finished withdrawing a slightly milky fluid from Kurt's spine and removed the needle, then shone his penlight on the spot Ororo indicated. His jaw set hard. He dropped his penlight and gathered Kurt in his huge arms.

"Storm, bring my bag and the fluid sample. I'm taking him to medlab, **now**."

He literally ran out of the room. Kurt lolled, unconscious, in his arms, his tail dragging on the floor behind him.

"Miss Munroe, what's wrong with Kurt?" Regis asked in a tremulous voice. "He never lets his tail drag like that."

Ororo glanced back at Regis as she gathered Hank's things. The boy was starting to hyperventilate, tears forming in his eyes. She wasn't sure who was more frightened, her or Regis.

"Kurt's very sick," she said, forcing her voice to remain calm. "We'll let you know more when we can."

She ran out of the room before her composure had a chance to break.

**:**

The words Hank used were not completely familiar. According to him, Kurt had both bacterial meningitis and meningococcal septicemia. She knew meningitis was potentially lethal, and she knew septic-anything had to be just as bad, if not worse. The pinprick rash on Kurt's neck showed up vividly under UV light, and seemed to spread down his back in front of her horrified eyes.

"How bad is he?" she whispered.

"I'm going to be honest with you, Ororo," Hank said as he hooked up the IV. "Untreated, it's 80% fatal. Treated, that drops down to 20%. The chances of permanent damage are much higher."

"What kind of damage?"

"Are you sure you want to hear this right now?"

Her hands started to tremble. She crossed her arms and grabbed her elbows firmly. This was the worst possible place for weakness.

"What kind of damage, Dr. McCoy?" she repeated.

"Brain damage, spinal damage, vision, hearing, organ failure. Sometimes we wind up amputating hands and feet. That rash can indicate necrotizing flesh. The antibiotics from hell I'm giving him should stop the bacteria, but they don't reverse the damage that's already been done." He slapped sensors on Kurt's chest as he spoke. "But I'll tell you this right now. If he pulls through, it's you and Regis he has to thank. You got to him within two hours. That may well have saved his life."

He put an oxygen mask over Kurt's face. "There's no way to be gentle about this, so I want you to forgive me in advance. Are you two intimate?"

She blushed slightly. "No. Why?"

"Because one of the only ways bacterial meningitis can be spread is by oral secretions. Little kids stick their hands in their mouths and spread it by touch. Adults tend to spread it by kissing. Have you done any of that lately?"

"No." _Not lately, or ever, and I'm starting to regret that, now....___

"Good. That means you're probably not infected, and I'm reasonably sure no one else is, either."

She stared at Kurt's unconscious form. He moved a little, mumbling something neither she nor Hank could understand.

"He's going to need 'round the clock care, isn't he?" she asked.

"Are you volunteering?"

"You couldn't blast me out of here with dynamite."

TBC….


	4. Today

**Behind Glass, part 4**

Two hours ago, she had met Kurt at lunchtime. He came in to grab one of Bobby and Rogue's sandwiches from the piles on the kitchen island, before all was devoured by the horde of incoming students seconds behind him. As usual, he grabbed his meal with his tail. That tail came in so useful at times like this, especially if he was unfortunate enough to arrive late. It was long and thin enough to reach anywhere, flexible enough to grab anything, and startling enough to be given its own space. Some of the kids would still jump when they saw it, reaching like an alien's long, blue tentacle, snaking between them and darting back again. It ensured no interference.

That day, for some reason, Bobby went into a hysterical giggle fit when he saw Kurt pull that maneuver.

"What's so funny?" Kurt asked.

"Um...nothing...," Bobby lied unconvincingly.

"You are not one to laugh at 'nothing', Bobby. You always laugh at 'something'."

Kurt held the sandwich, securely wrapped in his tail, about level with his head as he leaned against the refrigerator, his eyebrow raised suspiciously. This broke Bobby up again. Rogue looked at Bobby as if he was crazy.

Bobby pointed to Kurt's tail. "Remember B5 last night?"

Rogue gasped, her mouth and eyes wide, and then blushed vividly. She, too, was laughing, but she was also hitting Bobby on his arm. Bobby ducked and tried to protect himself, but he wasn't doing so well.

"You _creep_!" she giggled. "Ain't no way I can get that picture outa my head, now!"

Ororo stared at the two youngest X-men, trying to figure out just what was so funny. Kurt had the same confused look on his face.

"As you have told me so much, 'spill it'," he demanded, advancing on Bobby.

Bobby made a show of hiding behind Rogue, who wanted no part of it.

"Oh, no you don't!" she cried. "I ain't the one who thought of it. YOU explain, coward! Pervert!"

"But he's gonna kill me!" Bobby objected.

Kurt stood and crossed his arms, tail and sandwich swishing back and forth. "Pervert?"

Bobby watched Kurt's tail, put a hand over his mouth, turned around, and collapsed in hysterics, pounding on the counter behind him. Rogue looked skywards and gave a frustrated growl.

"I swear, I have to do _everything_ around here," she snarled. "All right, Bobby, but don't you go complainin' to me when he beats you black and blue!"

Kurt tapped his fingers on his elbow, waiting for someone to explain. The rest of the students had arrived, but they were holding off on the lunch grab, bewildered as to the turn of events. Rogue tried very hard to keep a straight face as she spoke.

"All right, there's this kind of old TV show called Babylon 5... and there's this guy on it? He's an alien, and he has six... tentacles...." She tried to smother her giggles. Bobby laughed harder. "And, they're not quite as _long_ as yours--" Bobby fell to the floor, screaming and rolling with laughter. She kicked Bobby, shouting, "That wasn't no compliment, dammit!"

"Yes, yes, six tentacles, go on?" Kurt said impatiently, making a rolling motion with his hands.

Rogue's words came out in a rush, as if she was afraid she'd never get them out any other way. "He's a Centauri, and they got six tentacles, and they can pick stuff up sometimes, and he used them once to cheat at cards, but they're not really hands, they're something else, all right?"

"Something... else?"

Kurt looked back at Ororo, realization slowly dawning on their faces at the same time. The older students were snickering, and the younger ones were still utterly confused.

"Only the guy Centauris got them, O.K.?" Rogue blurted before she dissolved into peals of helpless laughter.

The room erupted in laughter. Kurt just stared at the two, a stunned look on his face. "That. Is. Sick."

Rogue stood aside and made a sweeping gesture to Bobby, giving Kurt plenty of room to kick, should he so desire.

"I just lost my appetite, thank you," Kurt said as he turned to leave.

Curiously, he no longer had the sandwich, and no one could remember where he set it down. Then someone looked at the stacks of sandwiches arrayed on the counter.

"Mister Wagner, did you put your sandwich back?" someone asked.

"Yes," he replied. "No sense in wasting food."

"But which one is it?" one of the boys shouted, a hint of fear in his voice.

Only Ororo could see Kurt's smug smile as he went by her to exit the kitchen. "I don't remember."

"_Eeewwwww_!"

Ororo walked out with him, just as unable to contain her grin as Rogue had been. "That was a beautiful reversal, but it cost you your lunch."

"Some things are worth the price," he replied. "I must admit, though. That was a new kind of schwanz joke."

" 'Schwanz'?"

"Tail."

"I thought that was schatz."

He shook his head. "No, no, schatz is a term of endearment, like liebling. It is something Bobby would say to Rogue." Their voices were already low, but he dropped his further. "Schwanz means 'tail', but it also means something else. I think you can imagine what that 'else' is."

She grinned and looked away. "A natural double-entendre? I can only imagine how many dirty jokes you got."

"Keep imagining, because I got more. Just don't let the children know about it." Kurt sighed and rubbed his temple, his smile fading. "Aside from you and I, only Herr Professor knows German well enough to be aware of the joke, and I can only stand so many schwanz remarks at one time."

She frowned. "You're really tired of those jokes, aren't you?"

"No, it's not that. I just have a headache, that's all."

"Is your ear acting up again?"

"No, it is just tension. I have a hour and a half before I work with Regis today. I'm going to my room to rest until then. I'll be fine."

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_But it wasn't just a headache, was it Kurt?_ Ororo thought as she sat beside him in medlab. _And you had no way of knowing. You never had any reason to think you could get worse.___

Maybe this would have been easier for her to bear if he had been stupid, or macho, or immature. If he hadn't taken his antibiotics, or if he'd snuck in intensive exercise routines, or even gone swimming; anything she could point to and say, "See? Idiot? This is what happens when you disobey your doctor's orders!" But he had been a model patient. He did everything Hank wanted.

It just... happened.

Ororo had worked with Jean for so long that she was one step from a professional nurse, so she was released from all her teaching duties to be Hank's aid. She wrung out the sponge, then ran it along Kurt's right arm. Sometimes he mumbled in his delirium, always in German. A few times he opened his eyes, but never took notice of his surroundings. The hellish rash had stopped advancing, and Hank saw fit to take him off of the oxygen, but his temperature was still frighteningly high.

She lifted his arm and ran the cool sponge underneath.

The rest of the institute came down to see Kurt at one point or another. During the day, especially, he had lots of visitors. Xavier in particular spent several hours by his side in silent vigil, a hand on Kurt's forehead. Ororo didn't take too much notice of anyone else. She only had eyes and attention for Kurt.

The good news was that all of his internal organs were still functioning. The better news was that Kurt's oddly-shaped extremities had such unnaturally wide arteries and veins that they never completely lost circulation, rendering the horrific possibility of amputation moot. And that was all the good news they had. It had now been two days without further improvements in his condition. Ororo hadn't slept more than a few hours total. She felt like a wreck. She probably looked even worse.

She soaked and wrung out the sponge again. She touched it to his face, carefully following every lift and curve.

"I don't know if you can hear me," she said. "I've been talking to you for the past couple of days, and you didn't seem to hear me any of those times, either. But I have to talk to someone about you, Kurt, and you're the only one I trust, awake or not." He moaned softly as she ran the sponge over his forehead. "I know it hurts. And I know you'd never tell me that if you had a choice." She ran it down his neck. "You don't let people know when you're hurt, do you? When you're feeling sad, or helpless, or angry? When the words cut too close, or the jokes hurt too much? I suppose you only show those things to your God when you pray. You once said, 'the audience doesn't pay to see your troubles; they pay to forget theirs'. Is that how you see life, Kurt?"

She moved the sponge down to his chest.

"But I guess I'm not one to talk, am I? All this time, I've kept you behind glass, too. Do you know how many people have left me behind, Kurt? I lost my parents when I was four. I lost my childhood friends when I was twelve. I let Jean get close to me, and now she's gone as well. I'm tired of being left behind, Kurt." Her voice started to shake. "It's so much safer to put everyone behind glass. It won't hurt so much when they leave, then. When I felt myself getting close to you, I placed you behind glass with the rest, where I was safe from you. And you seemed so ready to wait there for me. I kept thinking about bypassing the glass, and it never seemed to be the right time, and still you waited. And now I'm so close to losing you forever."

She felt tears rolling down her cheeks.

"You can't do this to me, Kurt. You can't leave me behind like everyone else. You can't let me screw my life up by waiting too long. You've got to give me this second chance.

"Wake up, Kurt. The glass isn't helping this time. I can't live behind it anymore."

**:**

Hours later, things were still the same. What did she expect, anyway? That his eyes would open now that she'd poured her heart out to him? That he would turn to her, magically healed, and talk about this strange dream he had about her? A perfect movie ending to a swashbuckler romance. She was starting to remember why she hated swashbucklers.

Hank had been there and gone, checking the latest tests on Kurt's condition. He tried to get her to rest. It didn't work. Kurt simply laid immobile, as always.

Fifty-odd hours. Upstairs, the institute was sitting down to dinner. Hank brought their food down, then noted that Ororo had nodded off in her seat. He silently laid her meal on a nearby counter, then retired behind a partition to check the latest lab results as he ate.

Kurt started mumbling again. Ororo's head snapped up as Kurt's muttering grew more distinct. Still German, but identifiably so. Then he started to move, specifically turning his head from side to side. Ororo moved forwards in her seat. His neck had been so inflamed before that turning his head had been impossible.

"Hank?" she called. "Hank, he's moving his head."

Kurt's heart rate suddenly jumped. His eyes flew open, his breathing labored. He appeared to be looking around, but what did he see? His eyes passed over Ororo as if she wasn't there. Still in delirium.

Kurt's voice grew louder, and Ororo found she had to restrain him from getting up. Hank was suddenly there on the other side of his bed, holding onto one of his arms to keep him from ripping out the IV. Restraint seemed to terrify Kurt. He started shouting, struggling even harder, though he had no hope of breaking free. She recognized the word "no", but that was the extent of her knowledge. Maybe he was aware enough to hear her?

"English, Kurt!" she shouted back. "Talk to us in English!"

"Get him away from me!" Kurt screamed. "I can't...! Get it off of me! Get it off my neck! Don't let him put the chain on me again!"

Hank looked at Ororo and mouthed the question, "Stryker?"

She nodded quickly. "Kurt, I have taken the chain from him! Do you trust me? Look at me! I won't let Stryker use you again! I have the chain! Look at me!"

It could be a lost cause. He could be too delirious to hear her on any level, but she had to keep trying. He screamed the same things over and over, and she repeated her same words. After a minute he stopped screaming or struggling, silently looking around in his panic.

"Storm?" he asked weakly.

"I'm here," she answered.

He still didn't see her, but he did seem to hear her. "Don't leave?"

She gripped his hands in hers. "I'm not going anywhere."

**:**

Sixty hours. Ororo woke with a start in the dimly lit medlab. She had been laying on one of the unused beds, though she couldn't remember how she got there or when she went to sleep. Kurt's voice had awakened her. She raised herself on one elbow and looked over at him, ready to roll off the bed and spring to his side at a moment's notice. He groaned, lifted the hand without the IV to his face, then lifted his head just a little before laying it back down.

"Kurt?" she asked, swinging her feet to the floor.

He looked over at her, a bit bleary, but lucid. "Ororo?" He blinked. "You do not look well."

"I look better than you."

Kurt's gaze went to the IV, then awkwardly down to his chest. "What happened to me?"

"You almost _died_, that's what happened. How do you feel?"

He paused, looking straight ahead, brow furrowed with concentration. "You want a six year old child?"

"You remember me saying that?" she asked back.

"You did say that? I had such nightmares.... I do not know what was real... and what I heard."

She pulled up a seat next to his bed and held his hand. "Do you remember anything else?"

His tail reached out from under the sheet, then started tapping on something in that special way it always did when he was thinking. She never thought that simple motion could be so welcome.

"I think... I remember you crying," he whispered softly. He looked up into her eyes. "You did not want me to leave you alone." His hand squeezed hers feebly. "I remember thinking that I did not want to die alone, and I did not want to leave you."

Days of sleepless anxiety and dread finally caught up with her in this one moment of relief. She started to cry, and found she had no way to stop. Kurt managed to scoot aside, then pulled her toward him.

"There is room enough for you," he whispered, his voice soothing. "There will always be room for you."

She crawled onto the bed and curled up alongside him, her entire body trembling with fatigue. He put her head to his chest and stroked his thick fingers through her silken, white hair.

"Shhh.... It's all right, liebling.... It's all right.... Glass is for pictures... not for you."

**_Finis_****__**


End file.
